Avatar Bad Ears

My hearing has been compromised for as long as I can remember.

We all know how questionable it is at times because if anyone is going to mishear something it’s going to be me. Matters took a turn for the worse a few weeks ago when the hearing in my right ear went a little bit six-wide.

As I was driving down to Leeds for Christmas I experienced what can only be described as “bad ear” when I could feel something wrong and part of my hearing just disappeared. I could still hear everything although it felt as though some kind of substance was blocking my ear canal. It was a big muffled as though I was doing that thing crappy singers do when they close their eyes and hold their ear to hear their pitch and reach the high notes only Mariah Carey and dogs can reach.

Over Christmas I gently started scooping out the contents and as disgusting as this is to write it’s another thing entirely when experiencing it first hand. Normally I’m quite adept as keeping on top of personal hygiene; during the month of December this must have taken a flight abroad and forgot to leave a note. Waves of wax came out in all shapes and colours. I cleaned my ear with a delicate hand and with no proper medical help until January when doctors returned from their Christmas-shaped holes (I was resolute that I was not going to A & E or calling III because of earwax) I put up with my folly.

There was a ringing too, a constant ringing that wouldn’t go away. Looking back now I think it may have been before all of this, meaning it may be two problems or one problem in two halves.

I did a grown up thing and called the doctors. “I’m sorry sir, we don’t syringe ears on the NHS anymore,” said the receptionist, “it’s not considered to be safe. You’ll have to try elsewhere.” Hmmmm, said a sarcastic voice in my head, you won’t help me but encourage me to look into it myself? Go private? Okay, sure, I’ve got this, leave it to me.

I went to Boots for a free hearing test where they told me both my ears needed to be sorted out. I made an appointment for less than a week later to use a futuristic sucking device to clear out the mess and afterwards it was like that fresh minty feeling you get after you have your teeth cleaned at the doctors… only in my ears.

“Do you want the bad news first?” said the Boots employee, shortly after vacuuming my inner sanctum. Apparently my ears are now free of wax because she can see my eardrums when looking in my ear. The bad news is that some of the wax went so balls deep into my ear that some of it is lying on my eardrum and it’s too dangerous to try and suck it out. The solution? Olive oil ear drops. I’ve been squirting this stuff now for about a week in the hope that it’ll shake loose the wax, stop the ringing and give me my hearing back. If this doesn’t work, I may have tinnitus.

All in all January could have been a lot worse but then again it could have been a lot better.

Avatar The end of an era

Part of being an adult is knowing when to move on.

It can sometimes be a painstaking process because nobody wants things to end (that is unless it’s a certain house-esque particular room-based saga that will not be named for obvious reasons). An end is a sad time for all, a process which we are all prepared for at an early age and yet somehow still never manage to master it. What a sombre time to be alive.

Mr R. Brek died eleven years ago. I know this because it’s printed on his box. He has remained with me for all this time through now three job changes, two relationships and one pandemic (he was the emotional rock I needed when I was at my lowest). I don’t feel as though it is right to keep going though: he has served his purpose, he has provided a friendship that has never been in doubt and for all of this I think it is only fair that he is lain to rest. As in lain to rest for good now, properly. Over a decade and I’m still metaphorically flogging his corpse. This is not how you treat friends.

Goodbye Mr R. Brek, you will be missed.

Avatar A moment from history

“Oh dear, English hearts are broken the world over. Mrs Goggins has missed her penalty meaning that England are knocked out by Germany. They will not make it past the semi-finals and Germany will go on to play the Czech Republic at Wembley Stadium.

Goggins looks gutted, a world on her shoulder and nothing to show for it. Our thoughts are with her at this most trying of times. There was nothing more she could do. I expect everyone in Greendale felt that.”

Avatar The Ballad of Johnny Bobbins

The time is ticking on,
The passengers rustle and bustle,
The late-night hustle is winding down,
In his box he makes no sound.

There he sits, poised and ready,
A ticket machine in hand,
For those that missed the conductor,
He’s always in demand.

They queue up for his gains,
Without it no exit they have,
The gated gates where heaven waits
A ticket takes for “thems the breaks”.

The punters don’t appreciate
What Johnny does for them.
The abuse he gets for helping,
A champion among men.

No parade is held for him,
No day to cheer and smile.
A lone warrior with a barrier,
Our humble, faithful terrier.

Avatar Danger Run

Warning: this post contains gratuitous scenes of exercise. Viewer discretion is advised.

This boy has been running now, jogging now, a bit of a mix of the two since the start of the year. Rogging arounds wrong so let’s stick with junning. I’ve been junning since January. I have dabbled in it in the past however nothing substantial. I suppose with a lot of things collapsing in on itself it’s only fair that one tiny thing in my life prevails in a positive and optimistic fashion.

Cut to Thursday night though when shit got real.

I prefer junning at night because there are less people around to point fun at the tiny shorts I wear. The temperature is at a steady balance, much better than slogging through ice and snow anyway. I start my jun and headed off in the direction of my route. This route has been planned to perfection i.e. it features very little uphill bits and mostly flat or downhill bits.

There is a housing estate close to where I live that I do a couple of laps of to warm up. As I approach the edge of it I’m feeling the juice, I’m feeling the jun through my veins so I decide to speed up a bit. Down the first street, right at the end there is a footpath which curves round a corner down to the next street. Bounding like a chopper I go, I approach the curve and this is where it all goes wrong.

There was no slow motion here, no events slowing in my brain or anything like that. It was a short, sharp pinch in the eyes as far as my recollection of events goes. One moment I was junning away, the next I’m lying on the ground with scrape marks on my legs and blood staining the palms of my hands.

Some little dear had left their scooter in the middle of the path, something which you couldn’t see because it was round a blind corner. Unless I had leapt 2 or 3 feet in the air I was going to hit it every time. Not a full size scooter, no no, something someone just out of toddler-dom would use. I have no concern for myself, my god, I must check that my electronic life partner is still okay! The phone is nestled snugly in my jacket pocket, safe and sound. I stagger to my feet to assess the damage under a dimly-li lamppost.

Now this is exactly the kind of thing that I would do to myself; I am no stranger to injuring myself in unusual circumstances. What really sealed it as an ‘Ian’ moment though was just as I turned the corner and collided with the scooter a teenage boy was walking up the path from the opposite direction. He daren’t touch me, for obvious reasons (following Bovona guidelines to a tee) but asked if I was okay which was nice. As I stood up to brush myself down and turn to start running again he called for my attention. To my confusion and astonishment the boy brought over the tiny scooter. “You forgot this.” Luckily the violently sarcastic part of my brain was sleeping at the time.

Unreasonable reaction: WHAT THE F*CK DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING, LAD? DO YOU REALLY THINK THAT F*CKING SCOOTER IS MINE? F*CK ME, I COULD BARELY GET ONE OF MY TOENAILS ON THERE LET ALONE A FULL F*CKING FOOT. I’M WEARING SHORTS, I’M OUT JOGGING. WHY THE F*CK DO YOU THINK A F*CKING 37 YEAR OLD MAN IS SCOOTERING AROUND AT 9PM ON A THURSDAY F*CKING NIGHT? DOES THAT SOUND SH*TTING PLAUSIBLE TO YOU?

Panting through the stinging in my hands, I merely said that it wasn’t mine and thanked him for his concern. There I was, stumbling in front of a member of the public only for him to believe that the situation was that much worse because I had embarrassed myself by failing to use a scooter properly. Remarkably my legs were fine, a gash on one knee and nothing more, so I carried on with my jun.

This is getting too long. I did consider that perhaps this was some kind of cosmic karma for something else. A balance had to be made by me making a tit of myself. The day after I was in agony. Some bruising to my right side meant breathing, coughing, you know, any kind of movement caused a little jolt of pain to explode under my ribs. I am on the mend after a few days of rest and hope to be back junning later on this week.

Avatar Take a trip with me

Pack your bag, grab a coat and head off with me to a mystical place, a place where only the brave may date to enter and only the fiercest survive. If you have the courage then perhaps you will make it to the very peak of n’cle.

In all honesty, I’ve never been to n’cle. It’s clearly listed on a lot of signs around here but whenever I head in the general direction it disappears. It is as though n’cle is more of a concept than anything else, it’s a state of mind. You don’t go to n’cle because you’re either there or you’re not. You can’t get there if you’re already there. Yeah, something deep and meaningful like that.

I have dreamt of hiring a helicopter and flying closely over the terrain in the hope of finding a physical, tangible thing. Perhaps n’cle is so small that only the locals know where it is. Perhaps it’s a stump in the middle of a dell, or a well, or a part of Hadrian’s Wall with a bad smell.

These are all theories though and none of which get me closer to n’cle. I will forever be chasing it, desperate to taste it, smell its goods and embed myself within its warm embrace. Embed? Definitely embed.

Avatar Job Search

It would be quite fair to comment that I have done a bit of everything in my time on earth. Everything from washing machine repair man to fashion guru, I’ve been there, I’ve certainly done that and quite frankly I not only bought the damn t-shirt but procured the whole rack of clothes and displayed them in front of a multi-national crowd full of bigwigs and industry types.

So, what now? Where can someone with my set of skills possibly go except into space? It truly is the final frontier. I don’t know, it seems a bit too final to be shooting myself off into the unknown in the hope of finding a line of employment that could possibly compete with my bustling CV of “endless success”.

Last night I was trying to think about what else I could do, something that was within my grasps on planet earth which would negate the requirement for interstellar space travel (I’ve seen the figures and it is a smidgen too costly for me coppers) and do you know what my best idea was? What surged to the front of my mind to take centre stage, all my attention?

Ant mechanic.

I was going to use my tiny man hands to fix tiny ant vehicles. I would put those years of “experience” fixing washing machines to help our friends, the ants, to get back on the road after serious accidents and engine failures. I’ve got discounts and payment plans set up for regular customers. There’s Bonbon in the back, he’s good with people and ants, and looks after the place when I have to make deliveries. Running a successful garage isn’t just about fixing stuff after all, it’s about customer service, a friendly face and lashings of car air fresheners.

I can’t tell what’s a good idea anymore. I may have finally *finally* gone over the edge in a barrel. That is, unless one of you could suggest something new that I could try?